Preview: Warriors at Thunder

February 06, 2013|Reuters

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Preview: Warriors at Thunder

The Golden State Warriors are hoping to make like a baseball closer and forget the previous night as quickly as possible. The Warriors will be trying to bounce back from a drubbing in Houston when they visit the Oklahoma City Thunder on Wednesday. Golden State allowed the Rockets to match an NBA record with 23 3-pointers in a 140-109 setback on Tuesday night. The Thunder, who rank right up with Houston in scoring average, can take advantage of those holes.

The Warriors had won four straight before beginning a stretch of four road games in five days at the Rockets, but will likely be without center Andrew Bogut on Wednesday. The former No. 1 pick is being brought along slowly from ankle surgery and has not yet been used on the second night of back-to-back sets. Oklahoma City suffered a 104-99 loss at Golden State on Jan. 23 but has scored at least 105 points in four of its five games since. The Thunder hit 10 3-pointers in a win over Dallas on Monday and is 21-3 at home.

TV: 8 p.m. ET, CSBA (Golden State), FSOK (Oklahoma City)

ABOUT THE WARRIORS (30-18): Things got so bad for Golden State on Tuesday that it started fouling while down nearly 30 points in the final minute so that the Rockets could not make the record-setting 3-pointer. While the perimeter defense was atrocious, the offense struggled a bit as well. Leading scorer Stephen Curry was held to seven points on 3-of-12 shooting and the Warriors went 3-for-15 on their own 3-point attempts. They did not look like the team that had just pushed a winning streak to four straight with a 113-93 drubbing of Phoenix on Saturday. Golden State ranks in the bottom third of the NBA in scoring defense but had held three straight opponents under the century mark before falling apart at Houston. Curry led the way with 31 points in the win over Oklahoma City last month while David Lee collected 22 points and 12 rebounds. Curry stole a pass from Kevin Durant down the stretch and hit the free throws that sealed that win.

ABOUT THE THUNDER (36-12): Durant had 33 points in that meeting but he and Russell Westbrook committed key turnovers in the final minute to sink Oklahoma City. The Thunder had dropped two of three before beating Dallas and have had a tendency to let inferior opponents stick around lately. They suffered a 115-110 loss at Cleveland on Saturday and fell at the sub-.500 Los Angeles Lakers the previous weekend. But Oklahoma City has been much better in front of its home fans, averaging 108 points compared to 103.8 on the road. Westbrook is shooting 52.7 percent over the last three games and has cut down his turnovers in the last two to take some of the burden off Durant, who is suffering through bruised ribs. The Thunder needed only 28 minutes and 19 points out of Durant on Monday.

BUZZER BEATERS

1. Durant recorded his first career triple-double in a 119-109 home win over the Warriors on Nov. 18.

2. Curry has averaged 23 points on 53 percent shooting in 12 career games against Oklahoma City.